the i-witnesses

The reality of India’s IT challenge

A couple of days ago, I got a call from a British journalist based in India who wanted to do a story on India’s achievements in the IT sector. It was triggered by UK Chancellor Gordon Brown’s official visit this week.

Mr Brown’s itinerary includes a pilgrimage to one of India’s modern temples: the call centre. The Indian press exports glitzy images of call centres that tell of the country’s progress and wealth (while the Western media complains of foreign call centres “taking our jobs away”).

But this is a scene completely unfamiliar to millions of Indians: agriculture is still the dominant sector. So while I accept that call centres make a lot of money, I don’t believe they are the solution to India’s problems. As I see it, the real challenge is how the IT sector can be used to enhance agro-based livelihoods.

I’m keeping my fingers crossed that I’ll see a different story from my journalist friend!

Moves to unionise India’s call centres

Indian call centres and so-called Business Processing Operations (BPOs) have been heralded as providing world-class working environments for their employees. But there is dark side to India’s rapidly expanding IT sector: harassment of women is on the rise.

Call centres have transformed the traditional working culture and, in particular, have encouraged women to undertake night shifts – a rare happening in modern India.

But this has inevitably resulted in personal security issues for women who are generally looked down upon, sometimes even by their own colleagues. In Bangalore, for example, a female call centre worker was raped by a group of men.

Sadly, such sexual abuse and harassment in the IT industry hides behind a façade of modernity. It has taken major efforts – most visibly by India’s communist parties – for the powers that be to wake up to the situation.

The West Bengal Information Technology Services Association (WBITSA) - the IT sector’s arm of the powerful marxist Centre for Indian Trade Union - now offers services to protect call centre and other IT sector workers. This is the first ever step in India to unionise IT sector, and one which I warmly welcome.

WBITSA’s website suggests that: "women employees working in night shifts require additional protection and security. They also require sufficient conveyance".

But Sujoy Dhar recently reported in the Indo-Asian News Service that "senior officials from over 100 IT companies, including Tata Consultancy Services, WIPRO [both are in the Global 500], Cognizant, Globsyn earlier attended a meeting to chalk out counter strategies against the formation of unions".

[image: Panos Pictures]